To save rural health care, bring it out of the Dark Ages

Last year, Republicans in Congress cut Medicaid outlays and refused to extend Affordable Care Act enhanced subsidies. Yet less federal spending on health care threatened to affect a key Republican constituency: rural voters. To avoid retaliation for their actions, Republicans included $50 billion for rural health care in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, to be spent in various ways.

Here is the bad news. Even before last year’s legislative actions, rural areas in the U.S. were losing doctors, hospitals and even pharmacies. That trend is likely to continue, and neither party has a realistic plan to deal with it.

There is good news, however. More than 96 percent of Americans live within 90 minutes of a full-service hospital. That is the time span within which a procedure can be used to open a blocked coronary artery during a heart attack, avoiding death and disability. In contrast, only 71 percent of Canadians live within that window.

Also, specialists at the Mayo Clinic are treating thousands of stroke victims in rural settings every year across several states via telemedicine, usually within minutes of their arriving at the emergency rooms. Drones can deliver blood, vaccines and emergency medicines to rural hospitals, including clot-busting drugs for strokes, antivenom for snake bites and antibiotics for trauma. In fact, drones are already doing this on a regular basis in many African countries.

Nurses practicing at the top of their training can provide many of the services that are not........

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